


yeah there's a space

by toomuchplor



Series: Eamespreg [8]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Domestic, Fertility Issues, Fluff, Kid Fic, M/M, Male Lactation, Mpreg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-06
Updated: 2013-10-06
Packaged: 2017-12-28 15:03:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/993311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toomuchplor/pseuds/toomuchplor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur is not going to pass up the chance to apply his exceptional planning and organizational skills to their family, for once.</p>
            </blockquote>





	yeah there's a space

**Author's Note:**

> Audienced by xen. Idk this is just so fluffy and yet not. *hands*
> 
> Content notes at the end for anyone who might be worried about the fertility issues tag.

All four of their children may have been (happy) accidents, but when Arthur decides he's going to get pregnant, there is not going to be anything accidental about any part of it. It's terrifying; it’s worse than the most elaborate job Eames ever worked with him. Arthur has a moleskine with charts of his basal temperature, what he eats every day, how much exercise he did this week. When he and Eames have sex he writes that down, too: what position, who came first, and how long Arthur lay supine afterwards. He has one of those ovulation test kits and, _bloody hell_ when it says it's seriously time to get down to business, Eames is just—

—Right, well, he's never really had any complaints with Arthur demanding to be fucked, okay? That's not a feeling Eames has felt, and he hopes he never will. But it's amazingly unromantic, anyway, Arthur checking his wristwatch and stripping Eames down and pushing him onto the mattress.

They're used to hurried sex— that's all there is to be had with four small boys in the house, that and exhausted half-arsed sex. But this is more than hurried, it's regimented. Eames feels vaguely surprised by the whole thing, afterwards, Arthur hugging his knees to his chest with his arse supported by a pillow. "Did you want a cuppa," asks Eames, not sure what to do with his hands when there's no condom to dispose of.

"No," says Arthur, "shut up, I'm visualizing conception, it's supposed to fucking help or something."

"Well," says Eames, "I can tell you from experience that's no help visualizing a near miss, that did fuck-all when it came to Lucas. But then, you produce the spermatozoic version of the Terminator, so."

"We should get your semen tested, actually," says Arthur. "I was thinking that. Just to be sure."

"Right," says Eames, sure Arthur's having him on. "Wanking into a cup, fantastic use of my time." It's their first try, first cycle. Arthur's surely just winding Eames up.

***

Eames wanks into a cup at the fertility clinic; the nurse looks at him like he's mad when he asks her to watch his baby while he's occupied. Otis isn't six months old, yet. Eames is well aware this looks bizarre, and this doesn't even account for Bert at pre-K day camp, Lucas in preschool, and George shipped off to a neighbour's for the morning so Eames could go on this errand of insanity at Arthur's behest.

But it could take up to a year, Arthur has argued. Men don't get pregnant as easily as women, Eames' track record notwithstanding. Arthur’s clockwork body cycles regularly, four times a year, but he's in his thirties and secondary reproductive functions wane as men age, and Eames’ own sperm count could be lowered by the amount of time he’s spent gestating and breastfeeding, and — Eames wanks into a cup.

"Seems like a waste," Eames says to Arthur at dinner that night. "Every sperm is sacred, darling."

Arthur arches a brow, busy trying to convince George not to eat his paper napkin instead of his rice. "The ovulation window's ended for this cycle, anyway," he says. "Feel free to waste your sperm as much as you like until, oh, mid-November.”

"What's a sperm," says Lucas, who has been paying attention far more than Eames likes, lately.

"It's a thing that makes babies," says Bert. "Mum and Dad are probably going to make another baby, I guess."

Arthur rolls his eyes and spoons more cooked carrots onto George's highchair tray. They’ve long since given up on educating Lucas; that seems to fall under Bert’s purview.

***

Eames' sperm is brilliant, textbook perfect in motility and number, but Arthur remains unpregnant after their first cycle of trying. He starts taking herbal supplements, undeterred.

Bert starts kindergarten, Lucas dislocates his elbow (again), George gets his first big-boy haircut, and Otis goes directly from rolling over to sitting, the precocious little bugger.

"You're more likely to conceive if you're in a relaxed state of mind," Arthur says, a week before Halloween. He’s on his computer, scrolling through his fertility spreadsheet (the moleskine presumably having proven insufficient.) “We're taking a vacation."

"Christ, no," Eames says, horrified, jostling a burp from Otis with the reflexive squeeze of his arms. Their summer vacation had been an utter disaster. Everyone had screamed — even Arthur.

"Just us," Arthur says. "My mom and dad said they'd come up for a week and stay with the kids."

"I can't leave Otis for a week," Eames says, "I'm still nursing him.”

"Fine," says Arthur, "we can take Otis. But that's it."

"That's hardly fair to the others," says Eames.

Arthur looks up from his laptop and flattens his mouth.

"Fine," says Eames, "but if I'm leaving my children then you're leaving your work phone."

"Ugh," says Arthur. “Fine. Deal.” They shake on it, old working habit, though Eames didn’t ever have a dummy ringed round one finger back in their dreamshare days.

***

It promises to be an incredibly unromantic getaway.

But then, against all odds and reason, and in spite of Arthur sneaking his netbook into his luggage and Eames skyping with the children twice a day — somehow, it _does_ become a romantic getaway. 

They've not been ambitious enough to venture far, only up to Salt Spring Island and a one-bedroom cottage rental well off the beaten path. The weather is typical of the lower mainland’s coast, rainy and chilly and damp, dark early evenings and lots of excuses to build a fire in the hearth. But the cottage is cozy, lovely, and peaceful. Otis is an easy baby, too: a good sleeper and a champion eater and blessedly in a fallow period between bouts of teething. Eames has almost forgotten, how quiet and simple it can be, having only one baby to worry about.

"We should move here," says Arthur, the third evening. He’s totally unwound, barefoot and in his bathrobe, lounging on the carpet. “I could e-commute. The kids could grow up with all the other hippie kids."

"There are loads of hippie kids in our neighbourhood," says Eames, "and you would die without 4G on your phone."

Arthur doesn't argue, just unbelts his robe and waggles his fingers at Eames.

Afterwards, Arthur sprawls out on the couch, his mouth an insistent curl. Eames hasn't seen Arthur this properly fucked out in years — possibly not since before Bert. "That was it," says Arthur, smug, the cat that ate the canary. "That has to have been it. I can tell — I just know."

"Yeah," agrees Eames, sweaty and still-naked and embarrassingly breathless from looking at Arthur, god — Arthur. "No, you're right, that was it." Eames has spent so long being a mother that it's weird, thinking he's put a baby in Arthur, that he's acted as father, that his part is done — but oddly, he's just as certain as Arthur seems to be. It felt — right. Some deep part of Arthur answered to Eames, and it — it's all mad when Eames tries to put words to it, even in the secrecy of his mind. Instead he reaches out and grips the soft arch of Arthur's slender long foot, squeezes it.

"You should probably fuck me a bunch more to be sure," says Arthur.

"I was just thinking the same thing," Eames says amiably.

***

In December, Bert turns five, Lucas becomes obsessed with mermaids, George learns that he can get almost anything by combining the sign for 'please' with a winning smile and a babbled ‘mama’, and Otis goes mobile, crawling like a fiend.

Arthur isn't pregnant.

"So," says Eames, "February, we'll see if we can get the cottage again."

Arthur shrugs and knocks the negative test into the bin with the sweep of his hand. "I hate prenatal vitamins," he says. "They make me queasy."

"So stop taking them until you know that you need them," Eames says, wrapping his arms round Arthur from behind, kissing the side of Arthur's neck.

"I thought it was morning sickness," says Arthur, very quietly.

"Mum!" screams Bert, "Mum, Mum, help, George is stuck inside the couch!"

"Did he say inside the couch," says Arthur.

"Yes," says Eames, and kisses Arthur's neck one last time before going to find out how this is even possible.

***

But by the new year, they’re quarrelling a lot. This in itself isn’t unusual for Eames and Arthur; in fact, it’s almost a state of being for them, little jabs traded continually over every minor topic. Lately, though, it’s been less playful and more petty: shouting rows over who forgot to buy more salad dressing and why is it always Eames picking up after the big boys and how can Arthur be expected to take over the instant he gets home from work, he’s tired too.

Eames gets ready for bed with quick irritated motions, glaring at his reflection in the mirror while he flosses, annoyed beyond reason by the small sounds in the room beyond. Arthur’s getting undressed and taking ages to hang up his clothing, particular to a fault even when he steps over and around piles of play clothing like he doesn’t even notice them. Eames gets a little worked up thinking about it, honestly, scrubbing at his teeth and then washing his face. He feels achy, like his soul is the deep purple-black of a day-old bruise. He wants to be alone. It’s ages since he was alone.

Arthur’s sat up against the headboard reading _What to Expect_. He’s frowning at the book, whose spine is barely cracked because Eames decided early on when pregnant with Bert that it was an exercise in hypochondria, needlessly informative and alarming. But Arthur’s never found too much information to be a bad thing.

“Tomorrow night’s the concert at school,” says Eames, getting under the covers on his side of the bed.

“Oh fuck,” says Arthur, looking over, blinking, “is it?”

“You didn’t remember to write it down,” says Eames, sighing. “You can’t come?” Fantastic; Eames will have to manage four boys himself, and Bert will be off the wall with excitement, Lucas will be green with envy, and Otis is teething.

“It’s been so crazy at work,” says Arthur, sighing. “Fuck. Sorry, baby. It’s a meeting I can’t move.”

“Maybe you’re too stressed,” says Eames, and points his chin at Arthur’s book. It’s not a fair thing to say. Eames isn’t feeling particularly just.

Arthur closes the book and drops it on the nightstand. “My work matters to me,” he says.

Eames decides not to answer, just burrows down onto his side and closes his eyes.

They’re quarrelling a lot like this: cold patchy silences and feelings dragged out for days.

***

It’s February. Bert starts judo; Lucas kicks up a jealous fuss until they give in and enroll him in ballet classes; George takes a tumble and needs two stitches in his tiny perfect chin; and Otis pulls to standing constantly using terrifyingly unstable objects as his point of balance.

Arthur’s third cycle comes and goes.

“I’m ovulating,” says Arthur as he shakes cheerios out into two small bowls. His tie is loose around his throat but he’s shaven, hair neat. He was up before dawn running, back in time to help Eames with the circus of getting everyone dressed and fed before Bert has to get on the school bus. Arthur’s regimented as ever, following the dictates of his fertility plan as laid out on his vast spreadsheet.

“That’s too many, Dad,” says Bert, whining, “Dad, I can’t eat that many!”

Arthur scoops a handful out of Bert’s bowl and deposits the dry cereal on George’s highchair tray. “So tonight,” he says, “we should probably have an early night.”

“Hm,” says Eames, tucking a baggie of carrot sticks into Bert’s lunch. He cannot think of anything he’d rather do less than fuck Arthur to Arthur’s exact specifications tonight. This is a new, foreign feeling, but it’s unshakable. “Probably.”

***

Honestly, Eames still has fun fucking Arthur, for all he might drag his feet at the thought. Eames corners Arthur in the stairwell as they cross paths after bedtime, a couple of weeks later. “Hello,” he says, and crowds Arthur into the bend of the landing, “fancy meeting you here.”

“The window’s closed,” says Arthur, infuriatingly precise. “My basal temperature is — mmph.”

“Call me mad,” says Eames, pulling back to let Arthur breathe, “but I was sort of thinking we could have sex because it feels nice and makes us happy.”

Arthur rolls his eyes, smiling helplessly, and they have sex standing up in the landing. It’s fantastically frantic, awkward and hilarious and fraught. Eames takes Arthur up against the wall with their trousers pooled round their ankles, jerks him off until he comes over the antique wainscoting. Arthur nearly slips and falls on a puddle of silken princess dresses, and Eames’ orgasm is heightened by his smugness as he says, “I told you that you need to pick up the dress-up clothes, I told you about seven times, god, Arthur,” and Arthur braces his arms and catches himself and shoves back into Eames.

It feels good, normal. Something in Eames’ chest unknots a little. They’ll be alright.

***

But: “I thought I’d be better at this,” says Arthur, sitting on the closed toilet seat and dropping the latest negative test into the bin. His voice is awful; he’s fighting the tail end of a cold that’s ravaged the entire family the last two weeks. “I’m doing everything right.” He rests his forehead on his upturned palms. “I know it might take longer, but I’m just — I guess I figured I’d be like you. You always made it look so easy.” He clears his throat, or tries to, and launches into a long jagged coughing fit, his shoulders shaking under his soft grey t-shirt.

Any petty guilty urge to gloat over Eames’ own superior biology evaporates in a puff of worry. “Darling,” says Eames, stroking back Arthur’s hair, leaning down to kiss his forehead. “We’ll try again. It’ll be nice to have more space between Otis and the new baby, anyway. Remember how much easier it was with George when he came and the big boys were two and three?”

“Yeah,” says Arthur, not moving into Eames’ touch. He looks up at Eames, dislodging his hand. “What if we just quit,” he says, cracked tired voice, puffy eyes, red nose. “The longer this goes on, the more I start to wonder if I really want to have a baby or if I just want to — I don’t know. Prove that I can.”

Eames, who has long since been wondering the same thing, shakes his head. “We can quit if you want to,” he says. “Or take a cycle off — next one is May, we could skip trying and go again in August if you’re feeling better.”

“Or maybe you could,” Arthur says, and stops himself. He looks vaguely ashamed.

Eames hesitates, not sure if Arthur’s saying what he seems to be saying. “I could,” he repeats, carefully.

“Sorry, I’m just feeling like shit, ignore me,” says Arthur. He grabs a handful of loo roll and blows his nose.

Eames, who has long since been feeling that frustrated fidgety sensation that comes of watching an amateur try to do something you know you excel at, holds his breath for an agonized minute before risking a response. “Darling, if you’re trying to say that I could be the one to have the One Last Baby,” he ventures, “then”—

—“You’ve had four babies for me,” says Arthur, shaking his head, “it’s not”—

—“I would like nothing better,” Eames says, “if it’s what you want, truly.”

Arthur looks up at Eames, relief pouring over his features. He tries half a smile. “You — you’re not mad.”

“No,” says Eames, “god, I’m — Arthur, it was my idea to begin with, I’m the one who started banging on about a fifth, of course I’ll be the one to have him.”

“Her,” says Arthur, “have _her_.” But he’s already reaching out and tugging Eames closer by the hips, nosing up the hem of Eames’ shirt and nuzzling Eames’ belly, which hasn’t quite been flat since before George came along. “I want to,” says Arthur, a bit adenoidal but urgent, sincere. “Let me put a baby in you.”

“On purpose, for a change,” Eames says, charmed. “What, tonight?”

Arthur nods, wordless, and tugs Eames’ pyjama bottoms down, squeezes his arse cheeks, mouths around his cock while it perks up and takes an interest.

“I might not even be cycling,” says Eames, “christ knows, I’m irregular even when I’m not nursing, this could be an entire waste of your sperm.”

“I’ve got lots to spare,” says Arthur, pulling away and grinning up at Eames. “And if at first you don’t succeed”—

So Arthur fucks Eames for the first time since the previous summer, and it’s sweet and rushed, and Arthur comes inside Eames, lies over him, kisses the side of Eames’ neck and murmurs, “I don’t even know what I was thinking, this is better, you’re better at this, god.”

And Eames strokes Arthur’s back and laughs, and thinks that it doesn’t matter, they’ll still get their One Last Baby; and maybe it’ll even be a girl.

***

It’s three in the morning when Otis wakes up whimpering. He’s coming up nine months now and he’s been sleeping through the night for weeks, but the cold’s made him fussy and impatient with nursing. He’s hungry, no doubt, and Eames has milk enough to feed him since he didn’t take his fill at bedtime. Eames scrubs his eyes to open them up a little and thumps out of bed. Arthur doesn’t stir.

“Hi, little man,” says Eames, coming into the nursery. Otis is standing up against the crib bars, sniffing and messy-haired and bewildered. Unlike all their other children, Otis seems to have escaped Arthur’s brown-eyed genes. His blue gaze never fails to warm Eames with especial tenderness even when it’s the middle of the night and they could both be sleeping. “Hungry?”

Otis lifts a chubby fist with the thumb extended and pushes it up against his face. Eames always thought the baby sign language thing was utter shite until they’d tried it with George and discovered this magic: a preverbal infant able to ask to nurse.

“I know, I know,” says Eames, and makes the sign for ‘milk’ back at his clever boy. “Mummy’s here.”

Otis feels a little warm to the touch, feverish. He still barely manages a few minutes of feeding before he’s grumpy and turning his face away, tired of working to breathe through his stuffy nose while he nurses. Eames doses him with a little baby paracetemol and resigns himself to pumping before he can sleep comfortably himself. He goes into the en suite loo to spare Arthur some of the noise of the machine, sits on the toilet where Arthur was sitting earlier, and half-dozes while the pump wheezes and tugs at him. 

If it took, what they did tonight, thinks Eames sleepily, then Otis will be eighteen months when the baby comes. Eames was vaguely considering letting Otis be an extended breastfeeder like George and Lucas before him, but now he wonders about weaning him a little sooner, getting a break before starting over. There wasn’t a break between George and Otis, after all; Eames has been nursing for nearly two years continuously at this juncture. His tits could use a rest, maybe; he doesn’t much fancy a repeat of the early days with Otis, trying to juggle a wobbly tiny newborn on one side while George vied for room on the other, the great toddler sprawl of him.

Eames is dozy enough that he’s staring vaguely into the bin for a minute or more before he realizes why it’s caught his notice. The discarded test from earlier landed window-up, and though it had only one line showing when it went in — there’s now a blurry second line visible.

“Huh,” says Eames, digging it up. He tilts the stick, frowning. No, definitely two lines. He’s seen it often enough to recognize it by now. It has the look of a very early positive test. “Huh,” says Eames again. They must not have waited long enough for it to process.

Eames disconnects the breast pump and pours the milk down the sink, too sleepy to care about saving it for later. He stumbles back to bed and wraps himself around Arthur, kisses the back of Arthur’s neck.

“Is the baby crying?” asks Arthur, not really awake.

“You’re up the spout,” says Eames.

“Okay,” says Arthur. “What.”

“I’ve got you in the family way,” Eames says, palming Arthur’s flat chest, his belly.

“No, you’re doing that,” says Arthur. “We talked. We fucked.”

“Lucky you,” says Eames, “you can’t get someone pregnant when you’re already pregnant yourself. God, imagine if you could. I mean, you _can_ but it’s highly unlikely, you go sterile within days of implantation. It’s really long odds. What I’m driving at is that you’re pregnant, darling.”

“No, I’m not,” says Arthur, “ _you’re_ pregnant. Shut up.” He’s asleep again, more or less. So is Eames.

***

It turns out they’re both right. And really, by now they should know better than to play any sort of reproductive roulette.

***

It’s a row to end all rows, and it’s worse because there’s really no one to blame but themselves and their stupid gametes. But after they’re done hurling invective at each other in a mutual and deserved panic attack, Arthur says, “Well, I’m not — I’m having it! I spent months preparing for this!”

And Eames, appalled, says, “Are you suggesting I shouldn’t have _this_ baby because you called _dibs_ on reproduction?”

“God,” Arthur shouts, “of course not! When did I say that? You should have the baby. I should have the baby. We should both have the stupid fucking babies!”

Eames can’t help it; he breaks into small giggles, hysterical, and then the laughter broadens and deepens until he’s wiping at his eyes, helpless. So is Arthur, which helps. “This is the maddest thing we’ve ever done,” Eames says, taking Arthur’s hand.

“This is the stupidest plan,” says Arthur, agreeing. “Even Cobb would think this was a stupid plan.”

“So many things could go wrong,” says Eames, but he squeezes Arthur’s fingers and they both flop down onto the sofa, tired and overwhelmed and laughing in fits. “Oh my god, how will we even manage with both of us enormous and all these boys?”

“But hey,” says Arthur, “one of these babies has got to be a girl, right? Statistically?”

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Eames says. “I suppose it’s no surprise that we’re both awful at maths,” he adds ruefully. “Everyone seeing our family could guess as much.”

“After this we are both getting so many vasectomies,” swears Arthur. “Four each, to be safe. I mean, that’s math I can trust.”

Eames chuckles, exhausted, nervous, scared out of his wits. He looks over at Arthur, lovely Arthur, who is also exhausted, nervous, and scared out of his wits. “We’ll manage,” he says.

“Twins,” says Arthur. “Gestationally split twins, this is insane.” But he returns Eames’ gaze and his mouth twitches again. “Hey, do we have any oreos?”

“Oh,” says Eames, because Arthur disdains carbs and sugar and biscuits of all description, “this is going to be so interesting.”

**Author's Note:**

> Arthur has some trouble conceiving but it's really more along the lines of Arthur being a perfectionist who expects everything to go according to plan rather than legitimate infertility problems.


End file.
